“C. Q.”; or, In the Wireless House
money for medicine and doctors and to send mother to Egypt. Without it she ’d have died.
“Who is your father?” asked Sir Hubert.
“Fergus MacPherson,” she replied. Trevelyan seemed stunned.
“MacPherson! Why, he ’s been with the bank for over thirty years! It’s impossible! He would n’t betray his trust like that!” he cried angrily. “And why should any one else want to shoulder the blame for him?”
“On mother's account,” answered the girl. “If father had been arrested, the shock would surely have killed her. So Jim—Chilvers—said it was better for him to pretend he was the one. So we ran away, and here we are.”
“Oh, Hubert!” groaned Lily in a rush of sympathy. “Don’t arrest him!”
“A fine fool I ’d make of myself with the directors if I did n’t!” he retorted, the veins in his temples swelling ominously. “I never heard such a cock-and-bull story in my life! Aged father—dying mother—heroic lover! No, no! I ’m too old a bird to be caught that way. Why, you ’ve only got this girl’s word265
